The beat of the chopper blades thrummed like an angry hornet in the back of his skull as the medication steadily wore off. Raliegh closed his eyes against the blurring mist of clouds and wondered why he had agreed to this. Right. A suicide mission. The one thing guaranteed to make his life shorter than working top of the wall. Not that Stacker had said it was a suicide run, but why else would they track him down? Brain damage made it impossible for him to pilot long term again. Never mind his physical limitations. However; one final run, a fully-trained and experienced pilot with absolutly nothing to lose or come back too? Expendable and highly valuable all in one messed up package? Yes.
An ache built at the back of his neck. A tension that he carried constantly rising up to roll him into a ghost drift. Raliegh worried at a cut until it bled and the sharp sting anchored him in the here and now. He couldn't get lost in a drift now. They might refuse his right to pilot.
He had to go. Yancy was waiting.
Rain pounded on them as they climbed from the chopper and a small woman waited under an umbrella she tilted over Stacker leaving him out in the harsh weather. With the pain ramping up in his head came hyper-sensitive skin, each drop felt like a driving needle. The gentler rattle and rumble of the elevator came as a relief until Raleigh realized the high-pitched nerd wasn't going to shut up. He dug a fingernail into the cut again focusing on the fresh pain against the old.
Awkward stares killed any hope of welcome as he followed Miss Mori on tour of the Shatterdome. The sight of Gypsy Danger almost brought him to his knees with pride, grief and a thousand other emotions.
He held the migraine at bay with practiced control until the steel door of his room closed at his back. Raleigh scrambled into his bag with shaking fingers for his syringe and the near empty vial. Pills weren't enough at this level. He didn't even make it to the bunk before the meds kicked in and he sagged to the cold floor.
The fingers of his left arm eventually went numb as Raleigh blocked blow after blow with the bo staff. Candidate after candidate failed. Recruitment had grievously lowered their standards. These kids couldn't even keep up with him; and he was handicapped by stiff scar tissue and pinched nerves.
Sheer muscle memory kept the staff spinning and blocking with practiced fury. Going up against Mako took all the focus he had. He felt the drift compatibility, and it burned. Yancy's dying screams nearly drowned out the tentative drift caress. Instead of fleeing and running until he ran out of air in his lungs , Raleigh pulled Mako close declaring her his partner.
The nose bleed erupted in the locker rooms. How had he ever thought he could hold it together long enough to do this?
Standing once again in Gypsy's cockpit Raleigh trembled, memories flashing before his eyes. They never told that the RABBIT could take you outside of the drift, swallow you whole and drag you back into hell over and over again.
Only Mako's nervous excitement gave him the courage to strap in.
In Yancy's place. It was all wrong. So very wrong.
Her RABBIT consumed them almost blowing up the Shatterdome, and he didn't have the strength to guide her back out before it was too late and Pentecost refused the only drift partner that he could stand inside his skull.
The migraine from that episode he'd planned for, the pills in his system keeping him upright long enough to kick the Striker kid's rude, stupid ass. He didn't know anything. Newer was not always better.
Standing beside Mako watching the other jaegers fight two kaiju killed him. When had he started to care again? He had come here to die.
Hiding the constant agony in the drift was impossible. Mako screamed with him as the drift fell into place reopening bleeding wounds. She held him together when his mind threatened to shred under the stress of battle.
It was Maki who caught him as the clamps dropped him from their hold. He hadnt been prepared to drift this time and the pain wrecked him. She got his meds from the locker and they hid, huddling together in the bathroom, until he stopped puking.
They presented a united front to the cheering masses as Maki subtly kept him close looping their arms together and keeping him upright.
As they suited up for the run on the breach Raleigh realized that he didn't want to die today. The pain he carried was only physical now. The gaping emotional wounds had lessened. Healed by being surrounded by new and old friends and Mako's gently firm support.
He wanted to come back. Wanted to be happy. Wanted to live. Yancy would wait for him a little longer.